204 thoughts on “Deadpan is Lovely in the Fall

      • I remember a comedian making a joke after the first Voyager mission was launched (I think Voyager). It was going to provide the first close images of Saturns rings and he predicted Scientist would discover the rings were made up of all the socks that disappeared in the drier.

    • I’m hearing that you do need Instagram to have a Threads page.

      Were I to get serious about a micro-blogging platform, it would probably be in the Mastodon/BlueSky family.

    • I have high hopes for Spoutable, but it is only available as a phone app currently. Otherwise I’ll see if any of the other alternatives get enough traction to be viable. But surely, I won’t be on X much longer.

  1. I’m quite enjoying Baldur’s Gate 3.
    The husband has them all naked when in camp. Made for some interesting screen shots when one character laid in top of another. What was not suppose to be overly sexual suddenly became so when they were both without clothes.

  2. Crap joke for the day:

    An 8-year-old girl went to her grandfather, who was working in the yard and asked him, “Grampa, what is couple sex?”
    The grandfather was surprised that she would ask such a question, but decided that if she’s old enough to ask the question, then she’s old enough to get a straight answer. Steeling himself to leave nothing out, he proceeded to tell her all about human reproduction and the joys and responsibilities of intercourse.
    When he finished explaining, the little girl was looking at him with her mouth hanging open, eyes wide in amazement. Seeing the look on her face, the grandfather asked her, “Why did you ask this question, honey?”
    The little girl replied, “Grandma says that dinner will be ready in just a couple secs.

  3. Finally,FINALLY, after reading about it back in 70s in an encyclopaedia of science fiction, I’ve started reading Planet of the Apes by Pierre Boulle.

    The English translation of course.

    • I don’t read enough “high fantasy” to be able to spar with this author on a one-to-one basis. But I really feel like this was an attempt to get a long winded article out of their one statement “Fantasy stories are typically set in the premodern periods, and gunpowder is heavily tied to the advent of modernity”. At least that was why I always assumed there were no guns for the good guys or the bad guys. There just are guns in sword and sorcery.

  4. Random nerdery report:

    While doing other stuff, I pressed play on “I Married a Monster From Space” on Kanopy, watched the first half on mute, but actually finished the whole movie.

    It’s everything its title advertises. Probably too good for MST3K to properly savage. If you have a tolerance/penchant for 1950s Sci-Fi schlock, then I highly recommend it.

    https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051756/

  5. Last night a piece in our bedroom toilet broke. I guess it’s off to Home Depot this morning to see what’s involved in fixing it

      • Doing some quick measurements using Google Maps, Sentry Box has a footprint of 9,450 SF and Madness 20,000 SF. Granted, Sentry Box is two stories, but at least 60 percent of the first floor is atrium space to the lower level. So if we add an additional 40 percent to 9,450 that would bring us to 13,230 SF. That would mean Madness does actually have more floor space. Funny enough, doing a quick web search brings up both Sentry Box and Madness as being in contention as the largest.

    • I bought Baldur’s Gate 3 over the weekend. It is pretty funny how you make the characters walk around nude without comment, or at least for the few hours I played. In Fallout 4, if you walked around in your undies your companion was likely to say something like, “do you feel cold?” followed by a laugh.

  6. So someone recommended “Year Zero” by Rob Reid. The premise is about how aliens love earth music, but are bound to comply with our anti-piracy laws, and so have decided to destroy the earth to get around that.

    Silly idea, of course, but it seemed like a slam dunk for me. It has its moments, but also a lot of weak. I’m not sure if I’m going to finish.

    • I saw an online article concerning purchasing BG3 or SF based on a single question. “Can you talk to squirrels?” BG3 Yes, SF No, so they recommended BG#.

      • I have the talk to animals trait. I try to have a conversation with every animal I meet. It’s actually gotten me out of more that one scrap, and I made friends with a baby owlbear

    • There was also a film with the same name in 1987 with Emily Lloyd as an up and coming star. Her mental health problems would later make her miss out on a lot of roles.

  7. Went to the post office today to send a parcel. Their computers were down so I couldn’t sent it. That’s the first time that’s happened. Will need to try again later this week.

  8. I hate going to the dentist. Not because of the dental part. I always feel like they are trying to upsell to me. I don’t have any cavities, but I guess I need to go back next week because an old filling needs to be replaced.

  9. Definitely enjoying Ahsoka, but holy crap it’s basically the next season of Rebels. To really get this, you have to have watched a good deal of the Clone Wars and Rebels shows, even more so than the movies.

  10. I’ve really enjoyed what BOOM! Studios has been putting out lately. “Blade Runner: Origins” was excellent, and I love “The Many Deaths of Laila Starr”. Imagine if Gaiman was Hindi and wrote a story about Death.

  11. Lots to do this morning.
    Why can’t the husband make his own damn appointments?
    I might try the post office again while I’m out and about.

  12. Crap joke for the day:

    A guy walks into a bookshop and says “I’m looking for a book by Shakespeare”
    The shop assistant asks “Which one?”
    The guy replies “William”

  13. Well that is season 2 of Foundation put to bed.

    Enjoyed it, the final episode was more a case of exposition over action, but fingers crossed it gets a S3.

      • I sometimes take too long, but I wouldn’t say I need a “Shower runner” (sorry, funny typo).

        I may have said this before, but I avoided those books as a youngster because my trusted reading crew all said they were boring AF. I’m semi-curious, but I doubt if I’ll ever get around to them. I might give the show a shot someday. I know it’s been generally well-liked.

        • We just started season 2 last night. Binged season 1 about a month ago. Was a bit surprised that S1 seemed to get bagged on pretty hard. I thought it was a pretty excellent adaption of Asimov’s concepts.

          The stories as written are pretty much unfilm able. The originals in particular started as a collection of short stories where the characters are pretty thin, but the big events that happen ever several decades are the driver of the story.

        • I read the first book in the 7th grade (?) and loved it. Seems like there was just enough action.
          The 2nd book lost me as it was (as I recall) a great deal of thoughtful actions and political maneuvering. As a young kid it lost me but I went back and read it a few years later and appreciated it.

  14. Bored. The husband is at the dentist. I’m in the waiting room as we have errands to run after. It’s been about 45 minutes so far. Got lots of reading done but am now ready to move on

  15. Modern English has a new single out,
    “Long in the Tooth”

    On first listen I quite like it. If the latest reincarnation of the band follows this path I think they could make a go of it.

  16. Currently doing Nick Cave binge. It’s good, but I feel like with artists like him, you kinda need to be listening to music and words. If it’s just background music, then you’re not getting the full effect.

  17. Arrr. Happy International Talk Like a Pirate Day, y’all. Wore my pirate outfit to work again this year. About to listen to a presentation about how my company is involved in philanthropy.

  18. I’ve decided to push up my nerd glasses and not follow talk like a pirate day. Simply because, only Hollywood pirates said “arr” and, “Avast” and other such things. Real pirates spoke like everybody else in the world. So I guess you might say I talk like a pirate every day.

  19. Ugh. I hate Alberta. Hubby’s system is NOT in the SOGI program. However, I guess it was brought up at the last school council meeting whether it should look into it. That’s it. Not they should join, but they should look into if it’s right for them. Hubby texted today, 1/3 of his students are absent because of parent protest

    https://ab.sogieducation.org/

  20. Toured the little one’s school yesterday. Man, things have changed. In every class, the kids were able to sit wherever they want, able to get up when they want, able to just roam. And we watched a brief discussion in a class of 4th-graders where a bunch of kids and the teacher were fully engaged. I’d never seen anything like that outside of TV shows and movies – – I didn’t think it happened in the real world.

    • Yeah, it’s an interesting thing. My deep 20th century programming says, “You can’t do that, kids will just run wild and won’t listen!” – – and that’s probably true of some class situations, but this just seems like such a better way for kids to learn and go to school every day.

  21. There is a new rule in the European Union that passports can not have a start/expired period greater than ten years. Caught a few people out with passports that had been renewed before the rules changed and had more than 10 years on their passports.

  22. Crap joke for the day:

    Two young boys walked into a pharmacy one day, picked out a box of tampons and proceeded to the checkout counter.
    The pharmacist at the counter asked the older boy, ‘Son, how old are you?’
    ‘Eight’, the boy replied.
    The man continued, ‘Do you know what these are used for?’
    The boy replied, ‘Not exactly, but they aren’t for me. They’re for him. He’s my brother. He’s four.”
    “Oh, really?” the pharmacist replied with a grin.
    “Yes.” the boy said. “We saw on TV that if you use these, you would be able to swim, play tennis and ride a bike. Right now, he can’t do none of those.”

  23. The husband went to central office today so left the house a half our later this morning. It’s amazing how even a half hour can mess up my schedule.

  24. Played around with Google Earth VR yesterday morning. It might more aptly be called a Godzilla simulator because your perspective seems to always be from 300 feet up. So this is what Godzilla would see stomping around my neighborhood.

    • The danger is access.
      If people physically own media, they can watch anytime they want and they can share with others.
      In the rental days you might be a little at the mercy of the store’s hours and selection but there were often many options.
      With streaming, where less than a dozen outlets may be serving an entire country, when one corporate board or even just one guy makes the decision that they don’t want to carry something or maybe even want to get out of the business … that media evaporates with the flick of an off switch.

      • Exactly this. Also, no one makes a profit or collects data when you spin your DVD at home. Every time a piece of content is streamed, someone make money, and a bunch of database numbers get ticked and sold to advertisers.

        Sadly, I don’t think that people care quite enough about the obscure little gems to worry about them disappearing forever. But our current path could lead to a world where only s very limited set of movies are available for anyone to watch. OR – – only certain edits of movies are available for anyone to watch.

        Repeat the above statements for music and movies.

  25. I didn’t realize that David McCallum was Ducky on NCIS. It’s a show that Tiffany had binged so much, a few years ago, that I got to know the different characters. He was good.

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